


Signs Point to....

by Telesilla



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: 5 Things, Birthday Presents, M/M, Pre-Slash, Schmoop, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-28
Updated: 2012-03-28
Packaged: 2017-11-02 15:16:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/370410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telesilla/pseuds/Telesilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four times John gave Rodney cool birthday presents and the one time he didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Signs Point to....

Rodney pretended not to care about his birthday. He'd never had birthday parties as a kid--between his actual allergies and all the things his parents thought he shouldn't eat, attending an event involving candy or cake or ice cream or even fucking root beer was out of the question. He got presents, of course, and since he liked educational toys that part was okay, but overall, birthdays weren't the big deal they were to most of the kids he knew at school.

Once he went away to college, he'd occasionally go out and get a big greasy burger and a sugary chocolate shake on his birthday, but half the time, the only reminders of the date were the hand-made cards Jeannie sent him. As the years passed, those cards were replaced by store bought cards and then, of course, she stopped sending them.

By the time he got to Atlantis, he'd convinced himself that he didn't give a damn.

One -- 2004

He saw the box sitting on his desk when he stopped by the lab just before breakfast. The room was empty, but he still glanced around nervously, hoping no one had seen the box. It was probably some stupid gag gift, although it was weird that someone had bothered to look his birthday up just to make a joke.

"Of course," he muttered as he opened the box. "Ha fucking ha." It was full of candy--the simple boiled sugar candy that Corporal Mendes made every once in a while--and Rodney had no doubt that if he unwrapped one of the pale yellow candies, he'd smell lemon or maybe orange.

There was a note buried in the candy but Rodney almost didn't read it; he wasn't sure if he wanted to know who was responsible. He couldn't help being curious, though, and after a moment, he pulled it out.

 _Relax, McKay. They're made with honey, not citrus._ There were initials scribbled at the bottom of the note and it took Rodney a moment or two to see the looping J and a squiggle that looked like an S if you squinted.

There was no birthday greeting or anything like that, but Rodney couldn't think of any other reason for Sheppard to give him a present. It was typical of the man, really; of course Sheppard's birthday gifts were just as low key as he was.

Rodney was on his third piece of candy before he gave in and pulled up Sheppard's file. Huh, he thought as he checked Sheppard's DOB. He'd had no idea that Sheppard was a year older than Rodney himself. It wouldn't be fair to make a big deal of it, though, not after Sheppard had done something nice for him. Feeling virtuous, Rodney made a note of the date on his calendar and closed Sheppard's file.

When he tried to thank Sheppard later, Sheppard's mumbled "no big deal," was about as clumsy as Rodney's attempt at gratitude.

Two -- 2005

A year later Rodney had almost forgotten about the candy until the sight of another plain box on his desk jogged his memory. _Oh right, it's my birthday,_ he thought as he reached for the box. 

Expecting more candy, he was totally taken aback when opened the box. "What are we, ten?" he muttered, pulling the Magic 8 Ball out of the box.

 _Why are you bothering me?_.

Rodney narrowed his eyes and shook the ball a little.

_Concentrate and figure it out yourself_

The writing was really small, but it was printed and not handwritten, so Rodney could still read it. Sheppard had obviously gone through some serious effort on this one and Rodney couldn't help grinning as new messages came up.

_Are you seriously asking an 8 ball?_

_Redo the math and ask again_

_Don't you idiots have work to do?_

There was a note signed with Sheppard's squiggly initials. _I did the math and it takes an average of 72 tries to see all the answers. Have fun!_

Rodney tilted the 8 ball again. 

_42_

 

Three -- 2006

Area 51 was no place to spend a birthday. Rodney didn't want to admit that thinking about his birthday made him miss Atlantis even more, made him miss Sheppard even more. _If we were home--back on Atlantis--there would probably be a box on my desk,_ he thought as stomped through the lab, scowling even more than usual.

There wasn't a box on his desk here, of course, and Rodney shrugged and tossed his briefcase--a briefcase for fuck's sake--into a corner of the room. He missed his tac vest with its velcro pockets and he missed his sturdy tablet and he even missed the weight of a gun on his hip and....

There was a white envelope on his desk. It was big and while it felt like a heavy FedEx envelope when Rodney picked it up, it was plain white with absolutely no markings on it. "How the hell did he get it in here?" Rodney wondered as he carefully opened it.

Inside, between two thin pieces of tissue paper, was a drawing of Atlantis. Vaguely Rodney recognized it as one of the architectural renderings they'd done of the city early on, but he mostly he was staring at the colored lines drawn all over the city. _What the fuck...?_

It looked familiar somehow but Rodney couldn't quite figure it out. He was looking at a bird's eye view--a jumper's eye view?--of the city and there were lines crisscrossing it. Each line was a different color and each intersected thick dots of the some color; it looked like Sheppard had done some sort of weird abstract connect the dots project.

It made no sense, but there Rodney still had that nagging feeling that he'd seen something similar before and it was really starting to bug him. He put a finger on a dot on the green line, trying to figure out the corresponding point in the city.

"Oh, of course!" Rodney shook his head, feeling kind of stupid. The picture looked familiar because Rodney had seen maps like that on the subways of half a dozen different cities. All Sheppard had done was link the transporters on Atlantis together like they were stops on a subway line. There wasn't a note, but Sheppard's initials were scribbled on one corner of the map.

It was oddly beautiful, but it hurt too; as Rodney followed each line, he remembered each "stop" and each room that transporter was closest to. Why would Sheppard do this now? Had he decided on this gift before they left Atlantis and gone ahead with it because, with everything going on, he hadn't been able to think of something else?

Or.... Or maybe it was a message.

Rodney stared at the map for a long time before reaching for his 8 ball.

_Well duh_

Four -- 2009

After all this time, Rodney should have been looking forward to his birthday. As if proving that those first few years weren't flukes, John had managed to get him something weird or silly or just plain cool every year. It had forced Rodney to step up his game a little; he'd managed to get John a few decent presents too. The remote controlled cars had been a particularly good idea, although, since he got to play with them too, he kind of thought he'd cheated a little that year.

This year was a different story. As Rodney made his way to the lab, he wished he'd had the courage to tell John that he wasn't the least bit interested in celebrating this year. He was kind of hoping John had figured it out on his own, but no, there was a small, plain, white box sitting on his desk.

He stared at it for a long moment, seriously tempted to just shove it in a drawer and just thank John in the same awkward way he usually did. But no, he thought, John had undoubtedly put some effort into it and it would be rude if Rodney didn't at least look at it.

It took Rodney a long moment to figure out what he was looking at when he dumped the contents of the box onto his desk. When he finally recognized them, he supposed his confusion could be excused because he'd never seen tiny drink umbrellas closed up like this. It was still weird though. Why would John give him a dozen drink umbrellas and nothing else?

There was a note and, still frowning, Rodney pulled it out of the box. _Come by my place later for the rest of it._

Just like that, Rodney got it. Back last year, when they'd been stuck in San Francisco, Rodney and John had gone out for drinks. John had offered to buy Rodney a shot of some insanely expensive top shelf bourbon and Rodney had admitted that, actually, he preferred drinks with lots of fruit juice, rum and "you know, those little umbrellas."

Now, all he could remember was talking to John about whether or not he should ask Jennifer to marry him now or wait until after they knew what if they were going to be allowed to return to Pegasus. It had been a horribly awkward conversation; Rodney had learned a little about John's own disastrous marriage but he'd gotten very little in the way of advice.

He'd learned something else that night, something he was pretty sure he wasn't supposed to know. But, really, was it his fault he'd come back from the bathroom and seen, from across the bar, John clearly flirting with a good looking guy? He'd never said anything to John about it and he was pretty sure that his behavior around John hadn't changed, but still, it had been weird.

 _Maybe,_ Rodney thought glumly. _Maybe I should have stuck to guys too. Most guys don't care if you're sometimes an asshole._

That wasn't really fair to Jennifer, but they'd finally admitted it was over less than a week ago and Rodney wasn't ready to be fair yet. In fact, he was really ready to sacrifice a few brain cells to the gods of booze. And apparently, John knew that.

Idly, Rodney picked up the 8 ball.

_All my ideas are good ones._

Five -- 2010

Even though he knew there wouldn't be a present this year, Rodney went into the lab early anyway. He hadn't gotten much in the way of sleep, even after Jennifer and Marie kicked him out of the infirmary for the third time that night. It would have been four but then Marie had played dirty and threatened to call security.

"And if I have to do that, the noise and fuss might wake him up," she'd said and Rodney had finally admitted defeat. Marie was _mean_.

Rodney sank down in his chair and buried his head in his hands. Things had been completely awful for three weeks and Rodney had come close--so fucking close--to losing his shit on more than one occasion. And then, two days ago...well, Rodney wasn't really sure what had happened, since most of that time had passed in a blur of exhaustion, desperate hope, and a fucking _lot_ of gunfire.

After that, there was the familiar feeling of panic as Rodney tried to fly a jumper under less than ideal conditions, this time while a medic worked frantically to keep John alive. In fact, it was all too familiar, Rodney thought. How many times over the last seven years had they thought--had _Rodney_ thought--John was gone or lost or....

Rodney took a deep breath and let it out. It was over and John was back and safe and he was going to pull through yet another round of surgeries. Rodney did the deep breathing thing a few more times. Every time this happened, every time they lost John or he got himself hurt doing something brave and stupid, Rodney had to imagine life without him. And every time, it got harder and harder to do.

This time had been worse. A lot worse and Rodney would be stupid if he didn't know why. He wasn't, of course; knowing what he learned about John that night in San Francisco had changed everything. Or maybe he was kind of stupid, because it had taken almost losing John again for Rodney to admit what that knowledge meant to him.

And now that he knew the truth, what was he going to do with it? So what if John was gay or bi or whatever he was? It wasn't like that meant he was the least bit interested in Rodney. Rodney knew John liked him, knew that he was probably one of John's closest friends, but that didn't mean John was in love with him.

Only...well, there were the presents, presents John had clearly put a lot of thought into. Year after year, he'd made birthdays something Rodney actually looked forward to and maybe it was wishful thinking on Rodney's part, but that had to mean something, didn't it?

It sure as hell meant something to Rodney and maybe, just maybe, he should tell John that. Maybe instead of mumbling "thank you", he should say "I used to hate birthdays" and "my parents never let me have candy" and "no one's ever given me presents like the ones you give me" and "you need to know how much that means to me" and "I think I might be in love with you." 

Maybe....

He reached for the 8 ball.

_Signs point to oh hell yes_

_-end-_

**Author's Note:**

> The math to calculate how many questions it takes to see all the answers on a magic 8 ball is actually kind of complicated; it uses the [Coupon Collector's Problem](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coupon_collector%27s_problem). Who knew? 
> 
> Many thanks to Darkrose for the beta.


End file.
